Today in history
On Dec. 26, 1776, the British suffered a major defeat in the Battle of Trenton during the Revolutionary War.
In 1799 former President George Washington was eulogized by Col. Henry Lee as “first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen.”
In 1862, 38 Santee Sioux Indians were hanged in Mankato, Minn., for their roles in an uprising that had claimed the lives of hundreds of white settlers.
In 1865 James Nason, of Franklin, Mass., received a patent for a coffee percolator.
In 1893 Chinese leader Mao Zedong was born in Hunan province.
In 1917, during World War I, the U.S. government took over operation of the nation’s railroads.
In 1931 the Pulitzer Prizewinning musical play “Of Thee I Sing” opened on Broadway.
In 1941 Winston Churchill became the first British prime minister to address a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress.
In 1943, in the national football championship game, the Chicago Bears defeated the Washington Redskins, 41-21.
In 1944 in the World War II Battle of the Bulge, the embattled U.S. 101st Airborne Division was relieved by units of the 4th Armored Division.
Also in 1944 Tennessee Williams’ play “The Glass Menagerie” was first performed publicly, in Chicago.
In 1947 heavy snow blanketed the Northeast, burying New York City under 25.8 inches of snow in 16 hours; the severe weather was blamed for about 80 deaths.
In 1971, 16 Vietnam War veterans seized control of the Statue of Liberty to dramatize their antiwar stand.
In 1972 the 33rd president, Harry Truman, died in Kansas City, Mo.
In 1974 comedian Jack Benny died in Los Angeles at 80.
In 1975 the Soviet Union inaugurated the world’s first supersonic transport service with a flight of its Tupolev-144 airliner from Moscow to Alma-Ata.
In 1976 Sen. Philip Hart, D-Mich., called by some of his colleagues “the conscience of the Senate,” died in Washington; he was 64.
In 1980 Iranian television footage was broadcast in the United States, showing a dozen of the American hostages sending messages to their families.
In 1987 a bomb exploded at a USO bar in Barcelona, Spain, killing one U.S. sailor and injuring nine others; a littleknown group called the Red Army of Catalonian Liberation claimed responsibility.